|
Use the 3rd Edition Savage Species rules to grow up into a Winter Wolf. (Appropriate for tundra and cold places.) You could start as a puppy who hasn't learned Common, but as you spend more time with a human pack you learn their language, so when you finish out the monstrous levels, you'd be able to cast spells. (Or bend the rules, and intersperse monstrous with class levels.)
I know I'm having great fun with that sort of thing. The speech really is a lot of fun, because you can SAY animal-like things, and the mood of the game doesn't sound altogether serious, anyway. (I keep a list of interesting things I have eaten.)